


so watch what happens

by dimenovelcowboy



Category: Newsies!: the Musical - Fierstein/Menken
Genre: Fluff, jacks like. mentioned. but hes there., not technically an au because they aged like they would, oldsies oldsies oldsies oldsies, this is set during the women's lib movement !
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-17
Updated: 2021-02-17
Packaged: 2021-03-12 08:55:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 444
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29507241
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dimenovelcowboy/pseuds/dimenovelcowboy
Summary: katherine watches the women's liberation movement unfold
Relationships: Jack Kelly/Katherine Plumber Pulitzer
Kudos: 7





	so watch what happens

**Author's Note:**

> cried writing this no one look at me
> 
> hang out with me on tumblr! @dime-novel-cowboy

“Oh, Jack, turn it up, please.”

Katherine sat up from where she had been resting her head on her husband’s shoulder, dark eyes focused intently on the news. Videos of the protests that sprawled the city that day marched across the TV screen, signs shouting for equal opportunities (both directly and through clever slogans) bobbing in the crowds of women chanting the same message. 

July 26, 1969.

Almost 70 years since she had reported her first _real_ news story.

Almost 70 years since she nearly didn’t have the chance to do that, just because she was a woman.

There were more female journalists now, she thought. There were female journalists out there who were writing this news, who got to report their _own stories_ , who got to show the nation their perspective. 

And somewhere, there was a little girl sitting at home, thinking that one day she could do that. That one day, her voice would be the one heard.

When Katherine was younger, she had harbored anger about this. She knew, even then, it was misguided, and so she never let it show, but she used to be angry that these were opportunities she’d never get to take, that she had to grow up fighting to just _believe_ she could do what she wanted, much less actually _do_ it. But as she aged, watched her daughter grow up and have a daughter, watched them each have more opportunities than the generation before, that anger had eased, because she knew then that what she had done wasn’t in vain, and that she hadn’t failed by not getting further - she had just helped start everything off. 

If she had been 40 years younger than she was now, she thought, she’d be marching too. Now, though, at 86, she knew that, as much as she wanted to, it wouldn’t be the right idea. Not just because of the danger that always boiled barely below the surface at these protests, waiting for the slightest increase in heat to go splashing over, but because she knew that this was not a fight she was prepared to take part in. Ideas change over time, and though she did her best to keep up, in her old age, she knew that there were parts she was behind on, and that it was better to let those who could make these changes, make them. 

So that’s what she did. She supported the movement with every inch of her mind, heart, and soul, and anything that she could do, she did, penning letters to Congressmen and donating where she could, but in moments like these, she was content to watch history unfold.


End file.
